


nothing but my aching soul

by CloudedAbandon



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: M/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-21
Updated: 2013-07-21
Packaged: 2017-12-20 22:36:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/892706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CloudedAbandon/pseuds/CloudedAbandon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Its the 1920s and Matthew comes down for a visit. He might be sick but Alfred has missed him too much. So has Arthur.</p>
            </blockquote>





	nothing but my aching soul

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr. Inspired by "The Great Gatsby" and "Pacific Rim".

 

Matthew drives too fast, reckless, taking each corner like a promise. He isn’t even fully seated, poised on his knees as though he might vault over the steering wheel and off the bridge.

His hat is lost, wind throwing his short hair back.

He laughs, uncertain, until it builds and then, unbidden, there is a cheer and Alfred reaches over to clasp his shoulder.

With his other hand, Alfred holds onto his hat.

Behind them is a train of blue and red cars, following the monstrous garish yellow length of Alfred’s Duesenberg. In the distance, there is a pop of champagne and laughter and the sounds chase them, drowning out the creak of the bridge and shiver of the motor.

“I missed you, Matthew.” Alfred shouts, his hand coming up to cradle the back of Matthew’s neck. He squeezes, just briefly, before pulling away.

“What?” Matthew shouts, more attracted to the endless blue ringing around the city. “Gosh, Al. This is…this is just…”

“Don’t hurt yourself, Mattie.” He laughs. “This is nothing. Just wait.” Then, louder, he repeats, “I missed you, old sport.”

Matthew gives him a brilliant smile, eyes crinkled at the edges and all.

\--

“You say that all so often.” Matthew mocks, voice dropping when he says, “Old sport. Pass the salt, old sport. Let’s take the car out, old sport. Old sport, old sport.”

Alfred flicks sand at him, openly appreciating the way Matthew’s legs stretch out on the sand. He’s wearing Alfred’s old red and white striped bathing suit and it clings, takes him back a few decades.

He’s thin, all lines and some shadow in his face. His hair isn’t curly anymore. It’s as short as Alfred’s but it kicks up around his ears, like its trying, and Matthew just smoothes it back.

“Everyone says it.” Alfred defends. “They say it all the time, too.”

“Liar.”

“They say it all over London, too.”

At that Matthew laughs brightly and shoves him, eyes so luminous when he retorts, “You’re an awful liar, Alfred. No one says but you says that and no one says that anywhere but here.”

“Well they should.”

He knows he should ask Matthew what he’s doing here, what drove him so far south with only a satchel that contained a bundle of papers and an unmarked bottle of whiskey.

(They had drank it in one night and Matthew had ended up sprawled across his legs, murmuring _don’t send me back, don’t send me away, Alfred, not you_ and just like that, something in Alfred had sparked and flared the exact color of Matthew’s eyes and just as hot as his breath and Alfred, deep in his heart of hearts, knew he could never say no. Not then, with Matthew. Not ever, ever again.)

Stronger men have failed to resist the down-curve of Matthew’s half smile and Alfred thinks if he wasn’t weaned on fairytales, that night might have gone much differently.

But Matthew presses his forehead against Alfred’s shoulder, at that moment, and mumbles, “I missed you something awful.”

Alfred kisses the top of his head and watches the sun slip past the horizon.

\--

“You’re the guest of honor, dear brother.” Alfred laughs, pushing Matthew into a gaggle of pretty girls—all in matching slinky black dresses and feathers in their hair—before leaving.

There’s a swish of beads clacking around knees and when Alfred turns to look next time, the girls’ cheeks are almost redder than their mouths and Matthew has lost his tie and his mouth is a red slash as he dances and laughs.

Ten minutes later, his tie is gone and his cheek is wet where champagne had popped too close to his face but Matthew is dancing with two girls, glitter and colored paper speckling their shoulders and hair.

Alfred grabs a bottle of champagne and uncorks it as he walks, letting the foam spritz and spill over his hands. He flicks some of the liquor off his fingers, smile like a tease.

Some girl—she is familiar enough to have been in a picture show—smiles at him from under dark eyes and her slender fingers entwine with his thicker ones when she pulls him forward.

He can feel the fur from her stole under his hand.

Alfred gives her a smile.

\--

Smiling does not work on Arthur.

“If I had known you would be coming in, I might have saved some champagne.” Alfred says slowly, mouth feeling coarse. Thankfully the curtains are shut, casting the entire ballroom into shadow. His head throbs and he wonders what now.

“There’s some in that glass.” Arthur’s entire face is mobile in an effort to look disdainful.

“I might have upchucked in it.” Alfred gingerly raises the glass in his hand and then sets it back with a clink. “There might still be some whiskey left. Matthew brought some.”

“We drank that.” Matthew calls out from some remote corner.

Arthur looks like he would rather be anywhere else in the world.

When he tears open the curtains, Alfred suddenly agrees.

\--

“Ease up, old sport.” Alfred grins weakly, holding up his glass to deflect the sunlight where it manages to sneak under the umbrella. He has to wince when he wants to take a sip, but what else can he do?

“Do you two make a habit of this?”

“Only once a week.” Matthew cuts in, inelegant, as he stacks macaroons in a plate. Arthur gives them a pointed glower but Alfred just shrugs, chancing another sip of bourbon (okay, it is closer to some mountainous Appalachian moonshine but times are hard and women are a force to be reckoned with when they get something into their heads).

Matthew tended not to eat and if dessert got him out of bed and dressed then Alfred would bring in an entire French bakery, if need be.

Actually, nothing wrong with fresh bread whenever he—

“I am not going back.” Matthew says over his tower of pink and yellow macaroons. “I hated it there. I was miserable.”

“Matthew—“

“No.”

“Then return to London with me.”

“It rains.”

“It does not. Not recently.”

“ _No._ ”

“Oh, let him stay, Arthur.” Alfred smiles at Matthew. “He can stay as long as he wants.”

Matthew smiles back at him, all summer sunshine and macaroon crumbs on the corner of his mouth.

It’s criminal Alfred thinks when his heartbeat hitches.

\--

Arthur leaves when Matthew’s defiance becomes more vocal, pointed, and tearful.

(He flings the entire china set off the table with a swoop of his arm, cheek wet with tears, _shouting_ until Arthur finally stopped scolding and sat down with a heavy sigh and a murmured _fine_.)

(Matthew remains at the table until evening, eyes still wet with halted tears, and he does not immediately recognize Alfred when he comes to get him.)

\--

“He cannot stay here, Alfred. Please see reason.” Arthur whispers fiercely, catching Alfred’s wrist. Matthew had long gone inside. “He is sick. You don’t _understand_ —“

“He isn’t.” Alfred hisses, pulling back. The rage comes sudden and hot, flooding his face. It’s so familiar, so familiar to when Arthur had shouted at him, saying _you don’t understand, I know best, Alfred—_

“He isn’t sick.” He repeats, stepping back from Arthur. Arthur, who looks so tired and unsteady in his top hat and that cane. Arthur who looks aged and too formal; too out of place next to Matthew who is wearing a soft cream sweater and Alfred who matches but in a white one. “You are the one who doesn’t understand.”

And maybe he is crowding Arthur against the black Rolls-Royce, towering, leaving Arthur in shadow but Arthur won’t bend, can’t bend, probably, and soon Matthew is at his side, thin fingers pulling at Alfred’s sweater.

“Be careful, Matthew.” Alfred snaps, jerking away. “This came in just this morning.”

Matthew’s mouth curls into an ugly smile and he remains silent. But something in the cant of his head makes Alfred curl in on his self, despite the obstinate look he levels at Arthur.

“Won’t you come, Matthew?”

“Please give my regards to the ministers.” Matthew says easily. “Good bye, Arthur, good bye.”

He smiles until Arthur’s car is long gone and then, the tight edges start to crack and there’s a dripping fissure in his steely composure.

Matthew slumps and Alfred turns to go in, unable to spare another look.

“Matthew, let’s go for a drive.” When Matthew does not follow, Alfred turns, gaze upwards. “Matthew, please—“

“If I move now,” Matthew whispers, “I might run.”

\--

“I am sick, Alfred.” Matthew murmurs, his chin propped in his hand, as Alfred drives. The car roars down the empty dark road and Alfred ignores Matthew when he repeats himself.

“He thinks he knows everything.” Alfred says hotly, instead. “Turning up his nose at the china, scoffing at the drapes. Gold inlaid into the parquet and did he notice?”

“I left the sanatorium against the wishes of my doctor, nurses, and Arthur. I wrote to an old friend, a former minister in Wilfred’s government. Poor man, rheumatic and almost blind, but the dearest friend I could ask for. Caused such a row, they had to let me leave.”

“Matthew, enough.”

“I have not been honest with you, Alfred.” There is an ache in Matthew’s tone, a half-held breath that signals something awful and Alfred pretends Matthew is silent for the rest of the drive.

\--

Later, when Matthew is fast asleep in Alfred’s bed, lost in the vastness of his sheets, lost in his dreams, Alfred pads out of his room. He leaves the double doors slightly open, letting in the bright moonlight.

He stares out at the bay and scratches the back of his neck.

And, eventually, the sun rises and Matthew appears at his side, pale and almost rail-thin in the weak sunlight.

“What does this change?” Matthew asks.

Alfred shakes his head, saying, “Nothing.”

\--

“You have loyal servants.” Matthew notes, stirring his tea. The servants give him wide berth; have been doing so since Matthew’s fit at the table.

“I pay for their children to study and for their wives to stay fashionable.” Alfred replies with a shrug, turning the paper with a frown. “Don’t you know, Matthew, virtues can be bought nowadays.”

\--

There’s an indescribable loneliness in Matthew’s eyes, a fog of melancholy that never lifts fully even when Matthew is trembling with laughter. He has such a tight hold on sorrow that Alfred thinks he might not let go even in death.

It is enough to unsettle Alfred because he recognizes that look, that emptiness that overcomes a man’s eyes in the lull before twilight falls, when darkness brings blissful quiet and hazy dreams.

He notices but he cannot bring himself to talk about it. So he keeps Matthew’s glass filled with ice and good liquor, his plates filled with anything and everything Matthew looks twice at. He lets Matthew toss through his shirts, teases him about new shipments he has coming in because his men in London and Paris ‘know just what is what’.

“Do you even wear all these colors?” Matthew wonders, drowning in a sea of silk, paleness like a beacon in the sunset wools that frame him when he rolls over into last winter’s clothes.

“Help me wear them.” Alfred answers, looking back at the party surging below them. The wind ruffles his hair and Alfred closes his eyes.

\--

Alfred has always liked Matthew’s voice, his polished little accent, the way the words carry in the air when Matthew speaks rapid fast. He tells everyone that Matthew is French but no one believes him so eventually he just tells everyone that Matthew studied at Oxford.

The girls fall for his sweet voice and sweeter looks and it just isn’t fair how Matthew becomes the center of the party.

It seems all of Matthew’s acerbic wit has dried up. He’s endlessly smiling, ducking his head, and becoming something like a doe when people crowd him.

Oh, but he’s handsome and everyone notices that the most.

(Alfred leaves out the part where his brother is touched, still a little wounded from the war.)

\--

I told you he noticed.

(He just didn’t think it was important.)

\--

“So I bought this boat.” Alfred says when he opens his eyes and its dawn and Matthew looks around, baffled, shoeless and laying on the edge of the fountain.

\--

“Business is going well.”

“Isn’t yours?”

Matthew shrugs, leaning heavily on the thick white rope, leaning over and looking into the listless waves. “Maybe. Yes? Arthur handles all that.”

“I thought he did…something after the war.” Alfred waves his hand, lying flat on the deck, his hat on his face.

“Yeah, but I…have not been in Parliament for a while.”

“Not even to meet the Prime Minister?”

“No. There was an election…” Matthew trails off, his blue shirt damp with sweat. “Maybe. Arthur dealt with him mostly. Besides, Arthur liked him more than me. Oh, his name was probably Arthur. Maybe that is why....” He pauses, asking, “What about your president?”

“He’s not that friendly. Never expected to see him in office though so I could have been nicer. But he leaves me alone.”

There’s a long length of silence, broken by the distant shriek of a bird.

Then, Matthew spreads out next to Alfred and lifts his hat. Seriously, he asks, “Do you think we should be in our capitals instead of here?”

“You don’t like it?”

“I do but…shouldn’t we?”

Alfred blinks at him, still caught off guard by the bright light. “You think so?”

Matthew nods.

“Sounds boring, though.”

\--

“I’m tired with all that, though.” Alfred says on the way back. The sun dips lower on the horizon and he has to squint to see. “I’m tired of _them_.”

Matthew stays silent and Alfred figures that Matthew considers himself to be related to most of _them_ so what can he really say?

“We used to dream of this, Alfred.”

“Of sailing?”

Matthew makes a disdainful noise. “No. Of being able to make choices.”

“Oh? So you had a choice to go to the sanatorium?” Alfred retorts darkly. “You made the choice to go to war? Because I was strong armed. I also did not choose to ban liquor but now look at me. What choices can we make, Matthew?”

“…We made the choice to come out here.”

“…Indeed we did.”

\--

They choose to be shallow.

Well, at least Alfred did.

Matthew, honestly, just wanted to stop thinking.

\--

Arthur is back when Matthew glides up to the table, legs sticky with sand and water, golden and lovely and freckled, but with something tremulous in the curve of his mouth when Arthur looks at him, eyes dark.

“Did I buy horses?” Alfred realizes Arthur is wearing a riding uniform.

Arthur looks surprised, looks away from Matthew. “The King has cousins across the bay. I plan to visit them. They have horses.”

“I guess I should visit, too.”

“Please, no.” Arthur gives a long-suffering sigh. “You will embarrass me.”

“When have I ever embarrassed you?”

Matthew laughs, sharp and short and unpleasant. They both stare and Matthew just shrugs, helping himself to some tea.

\--

Arthur refuses to take one of the rooms in the house so Alfred gives him the dilapidated cottage.

One night, when Alfred can’t bear the pounding swell of the music, he pushes past the senators and gangsters and young men and women and stumbles into the dense thicket that hides his pool.

He stumbles and stumbles and leans against a tree, bringing his drink to his mouth and downing it. He leaves the glass at the base of the tree and lopes over to Arthur’s peering into the dim windows.

Alfred covers his mouth and Matthew presses hard down on Arthur, his grip like a threat against Arthur’s neck. His arm trembles though and his shoulders tremble and maybe he was crying because his voice is thick and rough when he speaks.

“—unbearable. You cannot even imagine—“

“Matthew, _darling_ —“

Matthew leans forward, breath like a gasp or maybe it’s Arthur who is gasping when Matthew bears down on him, face so close. “No, you _listen_ to me.”

Arthur’s fingers wrap around his wrist and then slide upward, letting Matthew’s robe slide down his shoulders under Arthur’s touch and then up to his face until Arthur is cradling Matthew’s cheek.

“Darling mine. I wish…”

And Arthur’s voice is unfamiliar, wrecked and lost in Matthew’s sobs. Alfred slides away from the window, down to the hard ground, and steadies his breath.

His heart throbs with each of Matthew’s sobs and even when there’s silence, Alfred thinks the echoes will stay for a long time.

\--

Alfred does not see Matthew until morning when he breaks from the water’s diamond veneer, surf still clinging to his lashes, and smiles nervously at Alfred. He swims up to the dock and Alfred sits down, with Matthew floating in front of him.

Alfred gives him a faint smile and says, “I have to go into the city today. Business. Boring business.” It isn’t a lie because he has to see a few men for different reasons and most of them are politicians but one is a very, very important, coming all the way from Chicago and Alfred knows its only right to be there. “You and Arthur should…” He trails off, thinking of Arthur’s face in the crook of Matthew’s neck, and then all the words leave him.

Matthew just nods, smiles, albeit a little half-heartedly, and then pushes back to float in the sunlight.

\--

Alfred comes home at dusk and cannot find them but when he turns a corner, he can see them from the window.

There is something reverent in the way Arthur touches Matthew, something hesitant and guarded, something that makes him pause before he tips Matthew’s gaze to meet his.

His mouth moves and Matthew shakes his head, drawing away and Arthur moves fast, gets an arm across Matthew’s waist and pulls him back and then they’re kissing and Alfred steps away from the window.

\--

“My servants might be silent but not everyone around hear is so mute.” Alfred says quietly when he gets Arthur into his car.

(Matthew is at home napping and could not be roused for anything.)

Arthur’s face closes and he sits stiffly.

“I just need to make this perfectly clear.” Alfred adds. “Now, just one question: was he sick before or after you took him to bed?”

Arthur tells him to pull over.

Then he punches him.

\--

When the fight drains from them, Arthur is breathing heavily against a tree and Alfred leans against the car, arms thrown over the doors for balance. His mouth is swollen and his face aches but Arthur is bleeding from his nose and his eye is already swelling and dark and so it’s worth it.

“You don’t understand.” Arthur repeats, the only non-vulgar phrase he could manage.

“I saw you both.” He spits out, blood staining his teeth. “He was crying and you could only…you couldn’t even stop, you—“

Arthur laughs, an awful empty bark, really, and falls back against the tree, sliding down until he’s on the ground. “No, no, I couldn’t.”

\--

“Even the most obedient soldier can only take so much. Enough shells fall on a man and…” He stops, voice hollow. Arthur is slouching in his seat, handkerchief to his nose. “Matthew was fine until Paris. They were all fine until Paris. Then, suddenly, the nightmares came at once.”

Alfred remembers broken porcelain and hot bitter coffee at midnight, waking up to his own shouts.

He wants a cigarette and Arthur obliges, for once. Even helps him light it before lighting his own.

“I had to choose…I had to send them all home but Matthew…I couldn’t let him go. It was selfish but…not him. Not him.”

“So, it is a human thing.”

Arthur gives him a cold glare and Alfred takes a drag from his cigarette and tries to focus on the road.

“But I would wake up and he would be at the window, leaning out into the night air. He would scream at night, fight the sheets and fight me until we were both bruised. I took him to every doctor and nothing helped. He would…” Arthur cuts himself off, his own cigarette forgotten as he stares ahead. “…I did not know what else to do. I took him home. I put him with the best doctors, the kindest nurses. They specialized in…soldiers who came home, less than. What else could I do?”

 --

“What else could I do?” Arthur asks and Matthew has no answer and Alfred sits outside, staring at the party back at the mansion.

“Did you even look back?”

“Everything screamed for me to come back to you, but I—“

“And now?”

“I no longer have the strength. Oh, darling, Matthew, _Matthew_ —“

\--

The boat bobs listlessly in the water and Alfred and Matthew lay side by side on the neck, under the slate-grey clouds.

“I drove him to it.” Matthew whispers. It is the first thing he has said in an hour and his violet eyes are red-rimmed. “He’s beastly, he truly is. But he wept, Alfred, he _wept_ —“

“Don’t go back with him.” Alfred says, hushed and serious. “Do anything but that. He loves you and you love him but do not go back to London.”

When he looks at Matthew, Matthew has tear tracks on his face, trailing down to his ears.

“I know.” Matthew replies, just as quiet. “I know.”

\--

“Belle and Francis are mad, honestly.” Arthur rants, slicing into his steak. The windows are open but it is hot and Matthew’s collar is unbuttoned and even the normally poised Arthur looks unkempt.

Alfred presses his cold glass against his forehead, gestures for the fans.

“And nothing good from Ludwig.” Arthur scoffs, stabbing at the still-pink meat. “I can’t even visit the Continent anymore for fear of setting someone off.”

“You’re all mad.” Alfred says moodily. “Is it so difficult to be content with you people?”

“Alfred.” Matthew warns quietly.

Arthur has stopped eating. His face is cold, withdrawn, and his tone is clipped when he says, “Not everyone is so easily pleased with yellow cars and imported rugs and—“

“Arthur, please.”

“You are the last person to lecture me, old sport.” Alfred slams his glass on the table. The table quakes. “I have seen your palaces. I’m surprised those walls haven’t crumbled from all the gold chips in your paint.”

“Oh, you noticed.” Arthur’s lip curls and Alfred reaches for his drink and he is not yet sure if he wants to drink it or throw it. “I was starting to question your eyesight because it took you _how many years to realize there was a w_ —“

“Enough, both of you!” Matthew snaps, shooting to his feet.

His cheeks are flushed but no one notices because Alfred shouts, “There is _always_ a war. You fought then, you fought before, and I’ll be damned if you won’t be fighting once more in a few years.”

“There will not be another war.” Arthur swears through gritted teeth.

“Doesn’t even matter.” Alfred sits back down, unaware that he was standing. “Go ahead, go to war. You still have colonies to hold you up. Matthew, I know, must still have some of that hoodoo stored away. He will bring back that fire and I will bring money and we will dig you out of the rubble and come back here for a nightcap.” He breathes heavily.

Arthur is stone-faced.

Matthew is white-lipped and still, all the color gone from his face.

“Will.” Alfred says, tone light. “He meant ‘there _will_ be another war’. And _when_. And how.”

“For god’s sake, Alfred.” Matthew says hoarsely, pushing away from the table. “There will not be another war.”

He leaves.

\--

Matthew leaves and Alfred watches him go.

“Thank you.” Matthew says unsmiling but sincere. He’s also tired but he’s sincere enough to hug Alfred tightly.

He and Arthur go to the city together.

Alfred takes a breath and starts making arrangements to go back to his capital.

It isn’t until years later (many, many years later when Matthew regains some of that wit, that coldness that defined him as a child) that Alfred finds out that Matthew did not go back with Arthur to London.

(When he does go back with Arthur to London, it’s not the same but Alfred saw the way Matthew had touched Arthur’s hand right after the meeting and maybe, just maybe, it’s better.)


End file.
